Ni de aquí, ni de allá. Neither from here nor from there, yet shaped by both, belonging to both, claimed by neither. As a Mexican woman raised in Utah, I have spent my life reaching for a place to fully land. I paint the creatures who carry that same search, animals and women who hold their ground quietly, who are more than what’s been decided about them. This is work about quiet strength, the kind that doesn’t announce itself, because it was never given permission to.
Entera en Both
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 16” x 20”
Three barn swallows in flight, each one carrying warmth and coolness within a single body. Each carries a different ratio; one leans more warm, another more cool, the third sits in between. Together they form a gradient, without any one needing to belong fully to either.
Barn swallows migrate between homes, never fully settled in one place for long. That felt true to my own world, not a divide between two cultures, but both of them living inside me at once, shifting from one day to the next, with the light, the mood, or depending on who's asking.
Some days I want to believe I belong fully to both cultures. Other days, reality reminds me I'm neither, not quite Mexican enough, not quite American enough, caught in the space between. Entera en Both is a wish, that the world could see wholeness in whichever gradient I fall in for that day, or moment.
Painted alla prima, using my restrained Zorn palette, with a bit of gold. Duality isn't always apparent, it just catches the light sometimes.
Part of my ongoing series, Ni de aquí, ni de allá.
Among, Not Of
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 18” x 24”
The bison once roamed this land in large numbers, belonging to it. Until slowly, cattle were introduced, and the bison herds that had called this land their home began to shrink, scatter, and were almost wiped out. "Among, Not Of" shows what's left of that history, a single bison, still here, still moving with the herd around him, now he's the minority in a landscape that was once all his own.
He doesn't fight the new herd; he doesn't separate from it, he simply moves with them, matching their rhythm, living in the same land, the same light, the same daily group. Belonging here isn't from likeness, it's closeness and rhythm, even when origin and history are different. The bison is still home, in spite of the land changing around him.
The Fire Remains
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 16” x 20”
There are things that cannot be taken. Not by fear, not by policy, not by the look someone gives you when they decide who you are. Not by raids, not by laws, not by the silence you choose in the name of safety. “The Fire Remains” was painted as a reminder of what stays when everything else feels fragile. What remains are values, identity, strength, the quiet knowledge and understanding of who you are, even if the world questions it. Whatever the world does, the fire remains.
El Hilo Que No Se Rompe
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 16” x 12”
She doesn’t stop. She doesn’t ask to be seen. She carries the child, the laundry, the weight of what must be done, and she keeps walking. Her shadow grounding her to the earth beneath her feet.
El Hilo Que No Se Rompe is my connection to my native home, the thread that pulls me back across every mile and every year of feeling in between. She is not anyone I know. She is everyone I come from.
El Toro
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 16” x 20”
When I began this painting, I stood between two subjects: a bison or a bull. The bison represented Utah, where I was raised. The bull, Mexico, where I was born. I painted the bull, not for acceptance, not for anyone else, but for myself. That choice contains the heart of this work, learning to stop translating, stop performing, stop trying to fit in, and paint from the fire I carry inside.
La Vigilancia
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 14” x 18”
Small. Exposed. Completely still. The meerkat doesn’t move because movement would cost too much, so instead she watches, reads the air, holds her ground from the highest point she can find. The background dissolves around her, loose and uncertain, while she remains defined, present, alert. This is the strength that doesn’t rest. The awareness that becomes a way of life.
Emerging
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 16” x 20”
The face is fully here. The body follows its own rules, dissolving into the background, neither completely nor gone. This is not unfinished. This is the truth of existing between worlds: some parts of you fully rendered, fully present, while the rest is still becoming. Still deciding. Still emerging.
Before You See Her
Ni de aquí, ni de allá
Oil on Canvas | Alla Prima | 20” x 16”
She was already watching before you knew she was there. Still, focused, completely sure of herself in a way that needs no announcement and asks for no permission.
Before you See Her is about that kind of presence, the strength that exists whether or not anyone stops to notice it. She doesn’t need to be seen to know exactly who she is.